At these times, we need a reason to celebrate. Well, today is International Day of Forests and this committee in Malawi are happy that they’ve educated their community to protect the forest. In Malawi, an area of forest the size of a football pitch is cut down every 10 minutes! For this reason, Ripple Africa started a Forest Conservation Project in 2007 and it now includes 170 Forest Conservation Committees who protect over 340 square kilometres of forest.

We are empowering local communities to take ownership of their forests by educating and supporting them to reduce illegal activity. This project works hand in hand with our other environmental projects, such as Tree Planting where we have planted 15 million trees and the Changu Changu Moto where we have installed 40,000 fuel efficient cookstoves.

We thank all of the Forest Conservation Committees for their dedication in protecting the forests before they are lost forever.